


Fodder for the Expose

by zarabithia



Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Community: femme_fic, Gen, Gift Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-04
Updated: 2010-02-04
Packaged: 2017-10-07 00:57:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/59632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zarabithia/pseuds/zarabithia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shore leave is never quite as relaxing as it's supposed to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fodder for the Expose

When a person first joined Starfleet, they usually had a certain amount of shiny misinterpretations about their impending careers. Those ideals varied depending on specialty and degree of naiveté , but generally included the inherent right to serve on the Enterprise during their first tour of duty, making department head by their twenty-fifth birthday, and breaking every record set by everyone from Jonathan Archer to Christopher Pike.

Needless to say, those dreams were summarily crushed and usually by the end of a cadet's first term. Still, a few idealistic notions usually lingered, waiting for the cadet to exchange their space boots for regulation uniform standard before shattering the lest vestiges of youthful optimism.

Shore leave usually fell under the category of crushed dreams. While at the Academy, most cadets viewed Shore Leave as glamorous vacations that always fell on a planet as exotic as Wrigley's Pleasure Planet.

As a lieutenant, any preconceptions Nyota Uhura may have had about shore leaves had long since been phasered out of existence. She could count on one hand how many shore leaves had gone _right_ and had been the peaceful breaks from the monotony of months worth of endless duty that they were supposed to be.

None of those times had yet to occur while she'd been serving on the Enterprise and with her ship's track record, Nyota would really be surprised if that changed during the remainder of the five years.

In fact, Nyota had great plans to someday write a scathing novel renouncing the entire idea of shore leave as a whole, and see to it that it was required reading at the Academy (there were plenty of years between now and the retirement that would give her time to write such a book, Nyota figured and between now and then she would figure out how to coerce the Academy into incorporating such a radical work into their course outline other than becoming Chief of Starfleet Operations, which would ruin Nyota's plans to actually visit Wrigley's Pleasure Planet during said retirement.)

Such reading material would let the future cadets down gently, Nyota reasoned, and that would be better for them in the long run.

Honestly, Nyota was trying to keep the future novel in mind as she relaxed on the massage table in the middle of the spa, between Christine and Janice. Spas and massages were not usually the way she voted to spend shore leave; she'd much rather be downtown taking in the local musicians and filing away their chords to incorporate to her own repertoire.

But it had been Christine's turn to pick how they were going to spend shore leave - because even the greenest of the green ensigns knew you didn't spend shore leave by yourself - and apparently this particular planet's masseuses had gotten quite a good review in the latest Starfleet Journal of Medicine.

As Nyota lay on her massage table and felt her muscles began to liquefy, she could definitely see where that review had come from.

Moreover, she was beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, that scathing anti-shore leave novel wasn't entirely necessary.

Then she made the mistake of opening her eyes.

It was a perfectly innocent mistake, and a well-intentioned one at that. She'd planned to turn her head to her left and remark to Christine that the nurse had really outdone herself in picking this resort to spend their shore leave.

The giant rat standing in front of her altered her plans a bit.

As she sat up - a delicate balancing act considering the apparently universal flimsiness of massaging robes - she wracked her brain, mentally reviewing all her cultural anthropology classes from the Academy. She couldn't _quite_ remember any sentient rat-shaped creatures, and she was _certain_ this planet wasn't supposed to have any.

To either side of her, her companions sat up too, and instinctively scooted closer to their weapons.

"Looks like this one's going to be another one for that novel of yours, Uhura," Christine noted.

"Yes, because what's any Academy reading without a chapter on rat women who don't knock?" Janice added at Nyota 's right side.

Rat women in armor that would have been appropriate to medieval earth, Nyota mentally added. And who carried not only the instruments of a troubadour, but writing implements that would have looked at home at Uhura's station on the Enterprise.

It was an interesting combination of attire.

"I'm sorry," the rat-woman announced. "But I heard there were warriors in this residence and I had to come immediately."

It was at this point that the masseuse stopped giving Nyota one of the best massages of her life and spoke up. "I'm sure these ladies don't want any part of your shenanigans. Go home."

"Oh, I don't know. What's a little shore leave without some well earned shenanigans?" Nyota asked, casually tossing her one leg over the other as she turned to look at the rat woman. "Why don't you start by telling us your name?"

Because really, it just wasn't polite to keep calling her rat-woman in her mind, even if she turned out to _not_ be a telepath.

"My name is Edore," she said solemnly. "And I come seeking soldiers for a _quest_."

Really, with an introduction like that, who could say no? Certainly not Nyota and her friends.

That decision was cemented when the details of the quest were laid before them, and even more so when it became clear that none of their communicators were in working order.

It was, in short, shaping up to be a typical excerpt from Nyota 's future expose.

~~~~~~~~~~

Janice threw an eyebrow lift over her shoulder that would have done Spock proud. "Remind me why we're just going along with this?"

"Come now, Janice, aren't you familiar with your Greek Mythology? Every good quest has to include trials," Nyota reminded gently.

"I hate Greek Mythology," Janice answered.

Understandable. Nyota was less fond of it than she used to be too. She supposed most people on the ship probably felt that way after that whole incident with "Apollo."

"So, who goes first?" Edore asked, rubbing her hands nervously. "Which one of you is skilled enough to take on this task?"

Christine and Nyota looked at Janice expectantly.

With an exaggerated sigh, Janice sat down at the table. "I am pretty good at chess," she admitted.

Twenty minutes later, their "pretty good" chess player claimed victory.

~~~~~~~~~~

"What trial is this?" Nyota heard Janice whisper to Edore. "Be nice to the old woman?"

"The crone," Edore cooed in correction.

Nyota wasn't so sure it should count as a trial. She'd wanted to spend her shore leave being musical, anyway. The fact that she was dong so as part of a "trial" didn't seem very fair.

But the old crone did just happen to have a lyre shaped instrument in the corner of her cabin, and Starfleet training had taught them to take advantage of every situation they could between communication courses.

And her parents had raised her to help others, so being nice wasn't a chore.

Despite the ease of the trial, Nyota was still pretty sure it was going into the novel. Mostly because the lyre shaped instrument, instead of producing pleasing soft sounds of its Vulcan counterpart, produced noises that she swore sounded like the cluckings of the blue spotted fowl on Thalia VI.

Which in turn, sounded a lot like a common Earth chicken.

~~~~~~~~~~

Capturing the flag was viewed by the Academy to be such a relic of years past and so archaic in its teaching methods, that it had been phased out as part of the training program ten years prior to Nyota's enrollment.

At that point, the "flag" had been replaced with an overloaded phaser, which had the result of making the game a little more immediate and real.

Somehow, the Academy believed that imminent death would help forge a spirit of teamwork better than capturing a ratty piece of cloth.

Possibly they were correct.

Unfortunately, whoever had designed the trials for Nyota and her friends were unaware of this, as they deemed a round of "capturing the flag" a perfectly reasonable third trial, with a regular boring piece of cloth instead of an overloaded phaser. A few obstacles merely gave Janice, Nyota and Christine reason to show off their fighting skills.

~~~~~~~~~~

"You passed! You passed! No one has ever passed the trials before!" Edore shouted excitedly.

Nyota noted, no matter how much her anthropology professors would have disapproved, that Edore looked a lot like a rat when she was excited, noble costume and all.

"Really?" Janice spoke with disbelief. "No one's passed them?"

Nyota privately shared the disbelief, but she didn't see any reason to say so aloud. "We passed the trials. Take us to our captain and crew members now," she instructed.

"Yes, yes, of course." Edore nodded agreeably, still bouncing excitedly. "They're with the others."

~~~~~~~~~~

The others, as it turned out, included half the population of the town and several dozen alien men from other parts of the galaxy.

"What's happened to them?" Nyota demanded.

"Long ago, an evil witch cast a spell on our planet," Edore began.

"A spell that only affects the men?" Janice questioned.

"They've been poisoned," Christine interrupted. "Nothing fatal…just enough to knock them out and keep them that way."

"Yes, and only the kiss of three strong champions can awaken them," Edore added.

"I don't think so," Nyota chided. "Can you come up with an antidote, Christine?"

"Give me five minutes," Christine answered. "And they should be good as new."

"But … but we've always been told that only a kiss from three strong maidens could awaken them," Edore protested. "That's why the men were affected and not the women."

"The poison likely latches onto the y-chromosome," Christine hypothesized.

Regardless of the exact reason why the "spell" only affected the women of the planet, their rat woman was confronted with a very displeased Captain Kirk five minutes later when Christine administered the antidote.

~~~~~~~~~~

As was quite predictable, Captain Kirk canceled the rest of shore leave and ordered the crew back onto the ship while the contamination was dealt with. Dr. McCoy and Christine did stay behind to help the medical personnel on the planet understand the nature of the problem plaguing their planet and how to prevent it from happening again.

But the captain of the Enterprise was a fair one, and he gave all those whose shore leaves had been cut short additional time off while the Enterprise was still in orbit.

Nyota spent the time practicing her musical skills and enjoying the company of her friends. It was probably the most enjoyable shore leave she'd had since joining Starfleet.

She agreed with Janice that it was likely not to make the final cut for the future novel, a small miracle for which Nyota was thankful.


End file.
